A new charity backed by celebrity Joanna Lumley has been set up to raise money
for children who lose their legs in the developing world.

Elizabeth’s Legacy of Hope was launched at a reception in the House of Commons on Tuesday night.

Guests included MPs, peers and public figures, including Heather Mills, the former model and charity campaigner, Shami Chakrabarti, the director of Liberty, and General Lord Dannatt, the former chief of the general staff.

Joanna Lumley, the actress and a patron of the new charity, sent a supportive message by video.

Ms Lumley said: “Elizabeth's Legacy of Hope is a new and far-seeing charity, which will change the lives of thousands of child amputees forever by providing them with the operations and the limbs they will need as they grow.

“By giving young limbless victims mobility and self-worth, Elizabeth’s Legacy of Hope will be strengthening communities and families here and abroad.”

The new charity has been founded by Sarah Hope whose daughter Pollyanna lost her leg when she was hit by a bus in south London four years ago, and her twin sister Victoria, wife of Conservative MP Richard Bacon.

Mrs Hope, whose husband is Telegraph journalist Christopher Hope, was badly injured and her mother Elizabeth was killed in the crash in April 2007.

Shortly after the accident Mrs Hope raised £145,000 for another limb loss charity, much of it from Telegraph readers, through two sponsored runs.

Elizabeth’s Legacy of Hope has now been established to focus on children who have lost limbs to offer them a bright and active future through providing loss prosthetic limbs and funding further technical research into prosthetics.

Since the accident, the Hope family has discovered what it means to receive the best care in the world and, albeit with some difficulty, Sarah’s little girl Pollyanna can walk, jump, skip and therefore play, just like her friends.

But thousands of children in developing countries don’t have access to good quality care and support.

As a result, they struggle every day as a result of limb loss. They suffer because of the injustice of malnutrition, accidents, landmines, illness and violence.

Mrs Hope said: “I am excited and thrilled to feel that we may be able to help thousands of children to walk again, after they lose their legs, in the most dreadful circumstances.

"We now know, as a family after Pollyanna lost her leg how difficult life can be. For about seven months in 2009 she could not wear her leg at all because she had to have an operation to trim the bone.

“This is a relatively simple operation, but without it she could have died. She needs lots of help in the house because she hops around and this could eventually damage the left side of her body. Even with the best care life can be hard.

"The memories of that terrible day will never go, they just fade. I do not believe things neccessarily happen for a reason, but this did happen. Out of this darkness, light is coming and that light must be bright, very bright.

“That light will be to see the smiling faces of amputees in the developing world jumping, hopping, skipping, running and dancing,being the happy children they were born to be.”

Victoria, also a trustee, said: “Every night Pollyanna ‘takes off her leg’ Immediately she reverts to hopping and crawling. But for most of the day she wears a prosthetic leg and, whilst it isn’t easy, Pollyanna is looks the same as her friends.

“It is inconceivable that she shouldn’t have a ‘leg’. So we must seize the opportunity we now have to help the hundreds of children around the world who suffer without limbs - and without prosthetics.